A woman from the town of Schirmeck in France's northeast region of Alsace told local media she was hit in the ribs by a meteorite while enjoying a cup of coffee with a friend in the early hours of the morning of July 6.
The woman, whose name was withheld by the local newspaper Les Dernières Nouvelles d'Alsace, initially thought she had been struck by a 50-gram piece of rock on the ground the size of a golf ball.
"I heard a big 'poom' coming from the roof next to us," she said. "In the second that followed, I felt a shock on the ribs. I thought it was an animal, a bat."
She immediately contacted University of Basel geologist Dr. Thierry Rebmann for identification as the color and texture of the rock were different from its surroundings. Rebmann confirmed it was a meteorite due to the mixture of iron and silicon.
What is a Meteorite?
A meteorite is a small piece of debris or remnant from a space rock called a meteor that originated in space and survived its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface. According to NASA, Earth is bombarded with more than 100 tons of dust and sand-sized particles every day, but most of it burns up before reaching the planet's surface.
What the French woman and her friend experienced was the latest in an extremely rare series of incidents where meteorites land on Earth and cause damage to property or injury to people.
Since Earth is 70% composed of water, the chance of meteorites landing on it is rare, and on a person even rarer. The odds of death by a space rock impact are only one in 250,000, according to a 2020 study.
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Death by Meteorite Very Rare, Geologist Says
The only time a meteorite killed a human being was in Ottoman-controlled Iraq in August 1888. A man from the village of Sulaymaniyah was killed and another man was left paralyzed during the incident. Documentation was created to be sent to the Ottoman government, where the meteor strike was described as "a strong bright light accompanied by smoke traveled toward a village."
Another famous incident of meteorites striking humans was when Ann Hodges of Sylacauga, Alabama was struck by an eight-pound stony meteorite that crashed through her roof in November 1954. The impact left her with severe bruising.
"Finding a meteor is already uncommon, but to be in direct contact and have it fall on you, that is astronomically rare," Rebmann told France Bleu Alsace. "We haven't seen that in decades in this region."
While the current whereabouts of the rock are unclear, Rebmann suggested scientists should study it further to confirm its exact origin.
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